


gotta find you

by asterbells



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Based on Dark Cupid, F/M, Gen, MLValentineExchange
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-14
Updated: 2016-02-14
Packaged: 2018-05-20 12:46:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6006601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asterbells/pseuds/asterbells
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This, of course, is when Adrien’s entire world is knocked off kilter. </p><p>Because on that stack of notes, clear as day, is the same handwriting as the one on his Valentine.</p>
            </blockquote>





	gotta find you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [arishia (OptimisticShipper)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OptimisticShipper/gifts).



> my mlvalentineexchange gift fic for [papaya-chan](https://papaya-chan.tumblr.com)!! i was super busy and ended up not being able to spend as much time on this as i should have i'm so sorry orzz
> 
> beta'd by the minion loving paola(@everywhere)!! ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

* * *

 

_Your hair shines like the sun, your eyes are lucky green_

_I look at you and wonder, your thoughts and dreams,_

_Yes, I would be your valentine, our love is so true,_

_Together for eternity, my heart belongs to you._

 

* * *

 

Sighing, Adrien holds the Valentine against his chest while he sits sprawled on his chair, head tilted back as he gazes dreamily at the ceiling. Caught up in his thoughts, he almost jumps a bit in surprise when Plagg gags next to his ear.

 

“Eurgh, you’re _still_ reading that Valentine? It’s almost a year old! I can’t believe you even still like it, although I suppose I should have expected that from a sap like you.”

 

Adrien frowns and turns his head towards the floating kwami.

 

“ _Yes_ , I still read it Plagg, what’s wrong with that? Just because _you’re_ not a romantic doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate poetry.”

 

Plagg scoffs, “Romantic shmantic. It’s throw-up worthy mush that you read at least three times a day. Every day. For half a year now. There’s everything wrong with that.”

 

Swivelling around in his chair, Adrien holds out the Valentine so that the both of them can see it, before gazing softly at the heart card. When he feels Plagg’s gentle weight on his shoulder, he lets loose another soft sigh.

 

“But Plagg, don’t you see? This is a Valentine from Ladybug!”

 

“You don’t know that, it’s not signed—”

 

“But it has to be Plagg, it _has_ to be!” Scooting closer to the table, Adrien grabs a pen and scribbles out the poem he’d written and discarded six months ago. “ _Your hair is jet black, your eyes blue as the heavens/ I want to ask who you are behind your mysterious mask/ I see you every day and I would like you to give me a sign/ I shall love you till the end of my days, will you be my Valentine?_ Look at it Plagg, I wrote this addressed to Ladybug! Who else could have responded like this if they weren’t Ladybug?”

 

Plagg’s scoffs of “Oh I don’t know it can’t be another black haired and blue eyed girl heaven knows there aren’t many of those in Paris—” are ignored as Adrien abandons the chair in favor of running over to the window. Lost as he is in his daydreams of Paris’ superhero, he doesn’t see or hear Plagg giving up.

  
“ _Gross_.”

* * *

 

“Alright students, listen up!” Madame Mendeleiev called the class to attention. “You all have a group exposition due in a week. I shall assign groups of four and give each group a topic. The first group will be Nino, Adrien, Alya, and Marinette. The second Chloe, Sabrina, Mylene, and Rose.”

 

Adrien tunes Madame Mendeleiev out as he and Nino turn back to the two girls sitting behind them. Alya tosses a quick note to Nino before turning her eyes back up to Madame Mendeleiev. Nino gives her a nod before sliding the note to Adrien and turning back to the front of the cass as well.  

 

_Let’s meet after school at the library to get things started! If we split everything up into sections we can probably work on our own after that._

 

When Adrien turns back, only Marinette is still paying him any mind and he gives her a quick thumbs up and grin before turning around again.

 

He doesn’t notice the _thunk_ of a head dropping behind him.

 

* * *

 

The group meeting goes as well as it can go for the first hour or so. The four quickly divvied up their topic and got to work. The second hour sees the same soft sounds of turning pages and pen scribbles until Adrien turns to Marinette and asks to see her notes on Gauss’ law. Completely engaged in her current reading, Marinette absentmindedly pushes her notes towards him without even turning her head towards him.

 

This, of course, is when Adrien’s entire world is knocked off kilter.

 

Because on that stack of notes, clear as day, is the same handwriting as the one on his Valentine.

 

The Valentine he’d been sent by who he thought was Ladybug.

 

The Valentine that had no sign.

 

The Valentine.

 

It takes Adrien about fifteen minutes to stop staring at notes, twenty minutes for Marinette to start twitching from the intense stare Adrien has on her, and thirty minutes for Nino and Alya to call the group meeting to a close from the lack of productivity on Adrien’s staring and Marinette’s incoherent bumbling.

 

* * *

 

Adrien honestly doesn’t remember any of the trip back home, not leaving the library, not getting in the car, not even entering the mansion.

 

The only thing he remembers is dropping on his bed in muted shock before Plagg, having already appropriated a block of cheese from his drawer, flies over to prod at his head.

 

“Yooo Adrien why the funny face? You look like the world’s ending~” Plagg’s mirth is cut short at Adrien’s silence. Hovering closer to his chosen, Plagg gently prods him again, “Adrien?”

 

Adrien rolls over and takes a deep breath before he lets loose.

 

“I-think-Marinette-might-be-Ladybug--...one-who-gave-me-that-poem-should-be-Ladybug--..saw-Marinette’s-notes-today... _exact same penmanship..._ Valentine-Ladybug-sent... _can’t believe...s_ he was there--... _in front of me_ !...whole time...maybe behind me--..don’t know anymore-- _Marinette-is-Ladybug?!_ ”

 

Plagg stares at him for a beat. For two. And headbutts him in the chin before ignoring the boy’s cry of pain and flying off to find some more camembert.

 

“Of _course_ I picked the most disgustingly romantic and also the densest boy in Paris. You don’t even know if Ladybug is the one who sent that Valentine but if you know it’s Marinette then just ask _geez_.”

 

* * *

 

When morning class ends for lunch break, Adrien finds himself following Marinette and calling out to her at her locker when she’s alone.

 

“Marinette!”

 

Although he thinks the one foot jump in the air is a bit uncalled for, he largely ignores her squawck and antics before turning to him.

 

“O-Oh…! Adrien! Did need yo— Need you d— Did you need something?!”

 

“Yeah, actually I—” Taking a deep breath, Adrien reaches into his bag and pulls out a single, red, heart-shaped card and holds it out in front of him. “ _Your hair shines like the sun, your eyes are lucky green/ I look at you and wonder, your thoughts and dreams/ Yes, I would be your valentine, our love is so true,/ Together for eternity, my heart belongs to you._ I got this Valentine this year and I…I was wondering if you were the one who wrote it…?”

 

Adrien’s not sure what to make of the series of expressions Marinette makes. Shame? Happiness? Embarrassment? Fear?

 

Adrien hastily adds on to his statement, “See I…I thought it was really sweet because it was an answer to my poem and I…I recognized your handwriting yesterday and…thought it might be you? That maybe you saw the poem I was writing that time when you were sitting behind me and—” His rambles grow increasingly in speed as his mind runs at a mile a minute.

 

 _Oh god was this too presumptuous of me? And here I was thinking Ladybug was the one who sent me the Valentine thank god I didn’t ask I’m so full of myself_ —

 

His thoughts are interrupted when the conflict and horror on Marinette’s face disappears and she looks up at him, determination filling her eyes as she answers him.

 

“I was.”

 

Adrien is silent as he stares at the girl in front of him, caught completely off-guard by her sudden solemnity.

 

 _But.... does that mean she actually likes_ _me?_

 

Startled by the oh so obvious and normal conclusion to the mystery that’d been nagging at him for the past six months ( _a response to a poem for a black haired blue eyed girl that he had written in_ class) and the possibility that Marinette, the sweet video game-loving class president who was always so kind and—

 

“S-So… So you…?”

 

From the heat he’s feeling on the back of his neck and his face, he’s pretty sure that his face is just as red as Marinette’s, if not more, as he stutters out the question he _really doesn’t want to ask_.

 

Marinette, thankfully (but is it really?), pipes up again, nervous energy and frantic words spilling out of her in a single wave.

 

“I-I saw your poem a-and I thought it was really nicely written and then those words just came to me because I thought it was really cute and I don’t know what happened I just wrote it down and uhm, Alya sent it off and I’m really sorry for reading the poem you’ve thrown away please don’t hate me!!”

 

It takes a moment for Adrien to process the words of the girl in front of him, desperately clutching at the string of her clutch and looking at anywhere not him, before he grins at her in relief.

 

“Hate you? Mar don’t be ridiculous how could anyone ever hate you?”

 

Smiling at the blatant relief that’s splashed across her entire demeanor, Adrien leads the way towards the hallway as they make their way outside.

 

“Although I have to ask, do you snoop through _everyone’s_ trash? Or just mine?”

 

Laughing heartily at the smack that meets his arm, he ruffles Marinette’s hair softly before running away from the indignant girl.

 

It would suck, he thinks, if Marinette really did like him because he’s still in love with Ladybug. He ignores the disappointment that’s lodged itself in his chest, despite the relief he felt at not having to reject his classmate and friend.

 

After all, Marinette liking him would only work out for them if she was Ladybug.

 

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> ER YEAH THIS DOESN'T HAVE AS MUCH AS I'D HAVE LIKED IT TO HAVE one day i will go back and write in marinette's pov one day i will go back and make things more fluid one day i will actually not be a lazy piece of shit but that day is not today orzzz
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/asterbell_s) | [tumblr](https://tei-gen.tumblr.com)


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